Bomb

Count me among the worriers that thought our debt was a problem at $ 10 trillion… and then at $ 15 trillion. I was wrong. Or, at least, those levels didn’t seem to phase investors, who kept putting down their cold, hard cash to buy U.S. Treasury bonds. As I shook my head over the past several years, we continued our profligate ways, and now our national debt stands at a whopping $ 20.5 trillion, slightly more than our annual GDP. It’s about to get worse. Much worse. I’m a fan of the recent tax reform, mostly because I’m a […]

I fully expect the Government’s Census Bureau to post a mind-blowing headline retail sales number for December. Hyperbolic headline economic statistics derived from mysterious “seasonal adjustments” based on questionable sampling methodology is part of the official propaganda policy mandated by the Executive Branch of Government. But I also believe that retail sales were likely more robust than saner minds were expecting because it appears that households have become accustomed to the easy credit provided by the banking system to make ends meet. Borrow money to “spend and pretend.” The Fed reported that consumer credit hit an all-time record in November. […]

Wouldn’t it be great if Congress was absolutely packed with strong constitutional conservatives that consistently fought for true conservative values? It has been said that our government is a reflection of who we are as a people, and the only way that we are going to take our government back is if we fight for it. I have talked to so many conservatives that are sick and tired of being betrayed by “Republicans in name only” over and over again, but the only way that we are going to break this cycle is if good people start running and if […]

I got chills when I saw a CNN report that said that a White House official has just warned that “the clock has now run out” on North Korea’s nuclear program and that “all options are on the table”. That second phrase has been repeatedly used by members of the Trump administration in recent days, and everyone knows what it means. When I wrote that a conflict with North Korea could be “Trump’s first war” last month, I was still hoping that cooler heads would prevail and that a military conflict could be avoided. Unfortunately, it appears that a peaceful […]

Are millions of Americans about to see the big, juicy pensions that they were counting on to fund their golden years go up in flames in the biggest financial disaster in U.S. history? When Bloomberg published an editorial entitled “Pension Crisis Too Big for Markets to Ignore“, it simply confirmed what a lot of people already knew to be true. Pension funds all over America are woefully underfunded, and they have been pouring mind boggling amounts of money into very risky investments such as Internet stocks and commercial mortgages. Just like with subprime mortgages in 2008, this is a crisis […]

According to the International Monetary Fund, global debt has grown to a staggering grand total of 152 trillion dollars. Other estimates put that figure closer to 200 trillion dollars, but for the purposes of this article let’s use the more conservative number. If you take 152 trillion dollars and divide it by the seven billion people living on the planet, you get $ 21,714, which would be the share of that debt for every man, woman and child in the world if it was divided up equally. So if you have a family of four, your family’s share of the […]

Is the prepper movement in the United States dying? At one time it was estimated that there were 3 million preppers in the United States, but in late 2016 interest in prepping has hit a multi-year low. The big reason for this, of course, is that the election of Donald Trump has fueled a tremendous wave of optimism among those that consider themselves to be conservatives, patriots and evangelical Christians. Not since the election of Ronald Reagan has the mood on the right shifted in such a positive direction so suddenly. But now that everyone is feeling so good about […]

If you reside on the west coast, you are living on borrowed time. As you will see below, stress has been building up along the San Andreas fault for more than a century, and scientists tell us that southern California is way overdue for a major earthquake. When that stress is finally released, the U.S. Geological Survey says that we could be looking at hundreds of billions of dollars in damage. If you follow my work regularly, then you already know that there has been unusual shaking all along the “Ring of Fire” so far in 2016. But thankfully the […]

This is part 2 of our 4-part series on the global deleveraging which is now beginning and is expected to last over the next 2 to 4 years. We anticipate a lot of pain for the global economy in the form of crashing security markets and depression-like economic conditions. This series will cover how we believe this crisis is likely to play out. We will not only help you understand what’s going on, but we will show you how to protect yourself from the coming economic turmoil. We’ll even show you how you can profit from it. If you missed […]

We woke up this morning to find oil prices weighing on the market… again… with China suffering the biggest losses. Oil prices have already kept stocks at bay in the best time of the year. Funny how this “Santa Claus” rally that I predicted wouldn’t happen this year, didn’t. The last time was in 2007 and 2008 – the last years the stock market crashed. I’ve been looking at how low oil prices will be the first trigger in the next crisis. Although it helps consumers a bit, low prices kill the $ 1 trillion QE-driven fracking industry that’s been […]